I’m the parent of a child who was in a similar situation - needed artic help, but not low enough to qualify in preschool. But she did qualify in school eventually. As the PP said, school speech therapy is bare bones. Even if your kiddo does qualify, you may find that supplemental private lessons are needed. You can minimize the sessions needed by asking for exercises you can do at home.
It does suck but it is important.

Getting speech therapy sucks so much. My rising K with articulation problems (half intelligible) was getting services through child find but I was not happy with the quality and finally supplemented with private. I also couldn't find in network (Cigna) so just found a local SLP that could get us in. Its been months and I'm still fighting with Cigna to cover as out of network. I'm paying $70 per 30 minute session 2x a week and will continue once a week after school starts. BUT he has made so much more progress since starting private and she is working on way more sounds than FCPS would put in the IEP. It is insane how much better he is doing with a better therapist.

I will also say, my 7 to also gets speech at school and I hear nothing from the school SLP. No idea how he is doing or what to work on. And getting them to add new sounds to the IEP is like pulling teeth. Plus it is all group sessions, not individual. And nothing over summer!

So if there is any way you can swing private, just get in wherever you can and pay for it and try your best to get reimbursed through insurance. It sucks but it's important .

Anonymous wrote:My 5 year old needs speech for articulation. Can’t find any that are in network for insurance (and the ones that do take it arent therapists but slpa which is assistants) so have to pay someone around $70 for a 30 minute session. He won’t qualify for speech at school because you have to be low functioning like bottom 20%. Is this anyone else’s experience? It’s frustrating because I’m the only one who can really understand him and he’s going into k.

I have seen many, many 5 year old kids whose speech is not clear at all but they go on to become normal by age 7+. I don't know the level of your child's speech issues, so you are the best judge. But while you figure out options, do try speech therapy videos on YouTube. You'll get ideas to start helping your child at home.

Anonymous wrote:Have you tried the Speech and Language departments of UMD or Gallaudet (I’m sure there are other departments at universities in area!)? They offer cheaper speech therapy services, also often on sliding scale.

I was coming here to suggest UMd- College Park. Both they and GW have programs for their students to practice. The MD one is excellent and was sliding fee scale back in the day.

We eventually found a speech pathologist whose rates were very close to what insurance would pay for “out of network”. S/he did not take or file insurance, but did give us the evaluation forms and documentation so we could file for reimbursement on an Out of Network basis. Our out of pocket cost after reimbursement was not more than $10 per session.

Suggest you talk with your insurer about what the out of network reimbursement max is for SLP in your plan, and also how to file with them for reimbursement for SLP services from an OON provider.

Have you tried the Speech and Language departments of UMD or Gallaudet (I’m sure there are other departments at universities in area!)? They offer cheaper speech therapy services, also often on sliding scale.

Anonymous wrote:Even with insurance, my kids speech is 95 a week.

True, we were paying $100 out of pocket - bc it was at the main children’s National campus, our Carefirst charged us the $50 copay and a $50 hospital fee. We ended up going to private bc it had a better location and the therapist challenged my child more. It was a bit more than $100 per session, but the care was better and the money was going to the small team.

ALSO- my brother had to have speech therapy for similar reasons and we could not afford what was recommended, so my mom explained this to the therapist and he only went to a certain number/frequency and my mom could observe (behind two way glass), and the therapist gave her assignments for him! I think with artic, if no other issues behind it, this works well.

If you say where you are located, we may be able to help!

Best to you!!!